the tragic writer

"what the hell is tragedy? i am." - sylvia plath

it was in my AP english literature class that i first read sylvia plath. we read lady lazarus; i wasn't even in class the day they started it, but when i read it, an indescribable feeling overtook my body, i felt so spiritually and emotionally connected to the poem and eventually began to look more into her writing.

it was also in this class that i first read franz kafka, and again, it prompted an intense hyperfixation. i sat and thought about what connected these two authors, and it all lay in their backstories. it was the tragedy. their experiences allowed them to pour this unique sorrow and incredible authenticity into their writing. it simply had to have been done by someone who has experienced what they did.

i love their writing, i envied the ability to write that way, and sometimes it feels like because of that, i seek out the hardest way to live, to go about life just for the story that i can tell after. it's weird. i think i'm a good enough writer, but it's like there's just something missing. something i crave to be able to describe- a feeling that lingers above my heart and makes it beat; painfully familiar yet so foreign.

bitter self-reflection:

I've never fully been able to describe my feelings. Being a poet, it's one of my life's most frustrating aspects. My entire passion lies in expressing myself through words, and yet, it's as if I can't even do that. Sure, I'm a good poet; I have a distinct voice and a consistent rhythm, but I feel incomplete with each period at the end of a stanza. At this very moment, I feel an indescribable heaviness in my chest, an aching pain that is never fulfilled; evidently, it just reappears. This is the same feeling I get when I think about a piece of media dear to my heart or contemplate the decisions I've made in my life thus far. These two examples are far from each other, and it pains me to know that I have yet to find the connection. The connection between nostalgia and the media that I hold so tight to my identity now. Maybe it's envy- a desire to create in the way those who inspire me create, to write with such intention and purpose. Such meaning in each line. It could be a desire for a tragedy in my life. An unconscious want for a tragic story where my problems can only be settled with pen and paper. But what happens when they are never truly solved, just pushed down? It's as if every piece has the same message, a message I don't know. A message that I can't figure out. Maybe a message that never even was.

i wrote that a long time ago, maybe a couple months, and it's even more discouraging knowing that i still haven't found that connection, but it's also somewhat motivating. maybe i'll get to be that tragic writer who searches all their life for it, but maybe that addiction inside me will dull my efforts, subconciously bringing me as close as possible to my goal, only to take one step backwards; all for the story.